Oh, it's on.
Well the summer film season is upon us and I've been trying to see as many films as possible. Over the past few weeks I've been to see The Da Vinci Code, Old Boy and the Fast and the Furious. All of which had their own merits. Fast and the Furious actually surprised me and it had pretty girls teamed with pretty cars along with the sparse use of japanese that kept me utterly entertained.
I went to see Ultraviolet this morning.
I've been waiting months for this film. The trailers were pretty awesome. However I'm in two minds about it. There are two films battling for supremesy here. One of them is a straight up serious science fiction film about opression and the like whilst the other is ultimate comic book pulp that is simply there for the eye candy.
From the opening scroll which shows Violet in a variety of comic book covers that riffs on the opening to Spider-man, with drawing styles reminiscent of Aeon Flux to Witchblade, X-men to Shoujo manga it's pretty clear what angle the studio was aiming for.
Now I know there were some pretty big problems with this film. Kurt Wimmer wanted hard hitting science fiction and the studio said, hey sorry, but this isn't going to work. Thus Wimmer came out and told the public that this film isn't his, the cgi isn't his, the tone isn't his, infact he doesn't want his name attached to the thing at all.
There are clearly still some of his influences here and he did direct the thing but since the editing and cgi came together after he left it's not suprising that it does become a mess at times. The motorcycle action sequence is pretty low grade special effects, the texturing is so low it's laughable. Now for most of the film this works for the comic book feel but it kept pulling me out. The script is laughable in some places. When Daxus says "Oh it's on." I nearly burst out laughing. Milla Jovovich has never been the best actress but she's makes the most out of the melodramatic emotions that she has to play here. Again Cameron Bright totally won me over though as Six and William Fichtner is always solid, even if he's playing a paper thin character.
Now I've explained a lot of the bad, but there is plenty of good. Ultraviolet has some of the best choreographed fights scenes that I've seen in a film for a long time. When Violet uses gun-kata I totally believe it, it's flawless, it's fast and it's totally believable as a hybrid martial art. In paticular check out the scene where Violet takes on the Blood Chinois and basically dances around their bullets. It just oozes an eastern style wow factor. The final fight between Violet and Daxus is beyond cool too, I mean come on - flaming swords?! Simply awesome.
This film has some of the best ideas, it's just a shame that there isn't a whole lot of pay-off. I mean flat-space tech, disposable mobile phones and mood effect clothing? These are pretty solid, let alone cool ideas for technology. I also liked how when Daxus shot three of the hemophages, they died in the sign of hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil. Hee! Oh the soundtrack totally rocked too, Klaus Badelt really shines with his encompassing choric orchestrations which nicely set the mood.
I'm a bit dissapointed that we didn't get to see the film that Wimmer wanted. I know they cut out a lot of Violet's backstory aswell as things that related to Garth. In fact the only information that we get on Violet is told to us by her, right at the beginning of the film with what is left of the flashback scenes along with a few lines of exposition during Violet's escape with the flat-space box. I really hope that one day, Wimmer is allowed back in to the studio and to use the footage he shot to craft the film he really wanted. I think I'll be picking up the slightly extended version on dvd though, which just happens to be already out in america since last week. :D
There's some films coming up that I really want to see. Namely Fearless, Pirates of the Carribean: Dead Man's Chest, Superman Returns, District 13 (the free running movie which just looks awesome) and Lady in the Water.
Oh in other news, I got my DS Lite (a smexy black one) a day early and have been playing a few of the games frantically since yesterday morning. Got the Bleach DS game which just pwns all except that Byakuya is such a cheat and constantly uses his bankai in the first move so that you have to guard straight away. Grr. I've unlocked loads of the characters though, Zaraki's story mode was haaaaard. As fighters go though it's pretty good and I've been kept entertained. The graphics on Metroid Prime: Hunters are pretty damn impressive, oh and Nintendogs is cyuutte.
Anyways, gotta run, that took too long and I've got to get ready for work. Fun.
I went to see Ultraviolet this morning.
I've been waiting months for this film. The trailers were pretty awesome. However I'm in two minds about it. There are two films battling for supremesy here. One of them is a straight up serious science fiction film about opression and the like whilst the other is ultimate comic book pulp that is simply there for the eye candy.
From the opening scroll which shows Violet in a variety of comic book covers that riffs on the opening to Spider-man, with drawing styles reminiscent of Aeon Flux to Witchblade, X-men to Shoujo manga it's pretty clear what angle the studio was aiming for.
Now I know there were some pretty big problems with this film. Kurt Wimmer wanted hard hitting science fiction and the studio said, hey sorry, but this isn't going to work. Thus Wimmer came out and told the public that this film isn't his, the cgi isn't his, the tone isn't his, infact he doesn't want his name attached to the thing at all.
There are clearly still some of his influences here and he did direct the thing but since the editing and cgi came together after he left it's not suprising that it does become a mess at times. The motorcycle action sequence is pretty low grade special effects, the texturing is so low it's laughable. Now for most of the film this works for the comic book feel but it kept pulling me out. The script is laughable in some places. When Daxus says "Oh it's on." I nearly burst out laughing. Milla Jovovich has never been the best actress but she's makes the most out of the melodramatic emotions that she has to play here. Again Cameron Bright totally won me over though as Six and William Fichtner is always solid, even if he's playing a paper thin character.
Now I've explained a lot of the bad, but there is plenty of good. Ultraviolet has some of the best choreographed fights scenes that I've seen in a film for a long time. When Violet uses gun-kata I totally believe it, it's flawless, it's fast and it's totally believable as a hybrid martial art. In paticular check out the scene where Violet takes on the Blood Chinois and basically dances around their bullets. It just oozes an eastern style wow factor. The final fight between Violet and Daxus is beyond cool too, I mean come on - flaming swords?! Simply awesome.
This film has some of the best ideas, it's just a shame that there isn't a whole lot of pay-off. I mean flat-space tech, disposable mobile phones and mood effect clothing? These are pretty solid, let alone cool ideas for technology. I also liked how when Daxus shot three of the hemophages, they died in the sign of hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil. Hee! Oh the soundtrack totally rocked too, Klaus Badelt really shines with his encompassing choric orchestrations which nicely set the mood.
I'm a bit dissapointed that we didn't get to see the film that Wimmer wanted. I know they cut out a lot of Violet's backstory aswell as things that related to Garth. In fact the only information that we get on Violet is told to us by her, right at the beginning of the film with what is left of the flashback scenes along with a few lines of exposition during Violet's escape with the flat-space box. I really hope that one day, Wimmer is allowed back in to the studio and to use the footage he shot to craft the film he really wanted. I think I'll be picking up the slightly extended version on dvd though, which just happens to be already out in america since last week. :D
There's some films coming up that I really want to see. Namely Fearless, Pirates of the Carribean: Dead Man's Chest, Superman Returns, District 13 (the free running movie which just looks awesome) and Lady in the Water.
Oh in other news, I got my DS Lite (a smexy black one) a day early and have been playing a few of the games frantically since yesterday morning. Got the Bleach DS game which just pwns all except that Byakuya is such a cheat and constantly uses his bankai in the first move so that you have to guard straight away. Grr. I've unlocked loads of the characters though, Zaraki's story mode was haaaaard. As fighters go though it's pretty good and I've been kept entertained. The graphics on Metroid Prime: Hunters are pretty damn impressive, oh and Nintendogs is cyuutte.
Anyways, gotta run, that took too long and I've got to get ready for work. Fun.